Women

Pus nou vieillit, pus nou pense,/ Au temps pâssaï qui n'est pus. From the Star, 1932, a résumé of an article written in 1842 describing St Peter Port in 1800. 

From The Morning Leader, Tuesday 18 April 1889, and Punch, 12 April 1889. Cuttings in the Priaulx Library collection. The original photograph from which the drawing is taken was by Thomas Grut. Do please contact us if you have an example of this photograph.

From the Gazette de Guernsey, January-September 1808, the spelling exactly as it was published. The 18th January was the occasion of a ball at the Assembly Rooms. The plate is dated October 1807 and is from the Library Collection.

October 1820. From a commonplace book in the Library, Flowers, from the Garden of Imagination. The compiler of the book is unknown, but there is a cipher on the flyleaf that appears to read 'FDC.' Another poem, To a Lady, is dated 'Guildford, August 2, 1817,' and has the legend, 'On her Friend's leaving Guildford for Ireland, where she is soon to join her.'

From Thomas Gosselin's Livre des domestiques depuis 1811, in the Library collection. 

A translation of an inquest conducted over several months in 1593 by the Colloque, or Assembly, of Bailiwick Churches. The Puritan ministers and elders had here to deal with a dreadful scandal. This piece had a genuine villain: Pierre Le Roy, known as du Bouillon, a church minister who had escaped the massacres of 1572. Formerly minister of the parish of Baron, in Calvados, he was now a refugee, in charge of the parishes of St Pierre-du-Bois and Torteval. The inquiry is full of the detail of the life of ordinary Guernsey people, who gave evidence to the assembly. Michelle Palot, a maidservant to Madame du Bouillon, the minister's wife, was the subject of continued harassment by du Bouillon. Having a baby out of wedlock was highly frowned upon, the mother usually having to do public penance and the father, once ascertained, jailed for a couple of weeks, and forced to marry the mother or at least support the child; but when Michelle was questioned by the authorities as to who had fathered her baby, she gave them a most unexpected answer. 

1593. Pierre du Bouillon's story unravels as witnesses speak out and brave Michelle Palot refuses to waver. The illustrations are from 'Le Cantique de Geneviève de Brabant' and  'Le vieux Château des Ardennes,' in Chants et chansons populaires de la France, Paris: Garnier Frères, 1854, in the Library collection.

'Guernsey readers will read with interest of the adventure of Miss Violetta Thurstan, who is managing an ambulance unit in Spain.' This article, from the Star newspaper of April 1, 1937, recalls her war service and brings readers up to date with her activities in the Spanish Civil War. Violetta received the Mons Star, the Russian Royal Cross of St George, and, twice wounded, was awarded the Military Medal.

From our newspaper collection. The Channel Islands News and Views, Vol. 2, no. 5, May 1948. Published by the Jersey and Guernsey Branches of the Communist Party, 30 Hue Street, Jersey and 6, Burnt Lane, Guernsey, and printed by Dorchester and District Newspapers Ltd. Joint editors: N S Le Brocq, 30 Hue Street, Jersey, and R G Hale, 6, Burnt Lane, Guernsey. Price: 2d. This number is the only example in our collection. Owing to its fragility, a scanned copy is available in the Library's Newspaper files. Any information about this publication would be most welcome. Here: A call for working-class women to stand for deputy in the island elections.

Two similar and unpleasant cases from the first half of the 14th century, one in the time of Edward I, the second under Edward II. Original documents in Latin. The illustration is of a French girl of the period, from Mercuri and Bonnard's Costumes Historiques des XIIe-XVe siècles, Paris: A Lévy fils, 1860, I, p. 78, in the Library Collection.